Computers comprise numerous different electrical, electronic and integrated components that require electrical power to function. Parts of this electrical energy are converted into undesired heat. This heat must be removed to avoid damage to the components from overheating. With the increasing development of computers, these electrical, electronic and integrated components, particularly integrated components and their circuits, are becoming smaller in spatial extent with an increasing performance. Accompanying this, the amount of lost energy is increasing in a smaller area. Therefore, the amount of undesired heat that must be removed necessarily also increases. The importance of a more efficient cooling of the heat-generating computer components has, therefore, increased.
Heatsinks for removing the undesired heat are known. Heatsinks are made of solid materials such as aluminum, and conduct undesired heat away from the electrical, electronic and integrated components to the ambient air.
Providing a cooling arrangement for cooling the heat-generating computer components, with a first and at least one second heat-creating computer component, each coupled to at least one heatsink, is known from US 2008/0041562 A1. The heatsinks are arranged one after the other in a single plane, in the direction of a provided coolant air stream. This arrangement implies that only coolant air that has been preheated by the upstream heatsink reaches the heatsink arranged downstream in the direction of the coolant air. Accordingly, the cooling power that can be achieved at the downstream heatsink in such an arrangement is always lower than the cooling power at the upstream heatsink. To compensate for this effect and nonetheless achieve sufficient cooling at the downstream heatsink, it is proposed in US 2008/0041562 A1 that the cooling power at the downstream heatsink be improved by forming a coolant air stream that passes the first heatsink and the second heatsink and, thus, cools the two heatsinks one after the other. It is additionally proposed, according to US 2008/0041562A1, that an additional coolant air stream be formed, which cools only the downstream heatsink. Alternatively to this measure, it is proposed in US 2008/0041562 that the downstream heatsink be formed larger than the upstream heatsink, and, thus, the surface of the downstream heatsink be increased relative to the upstream heatsink, and in that way, the heat transfer properties of the downstream heatsink for emitting heat to the coolant air be improved in comparison to the upstream heatsink. To form the larger surface area, narrower spacings of the cooling fins, or higher cooling fins in comparison to the upstream heatsink are proposed.
This solution is suitable for improving the cooling properties of the downstream heatsink, but leads to increased production costs because a larger number of cooling fins are produced due to the narrower spacing between the cooling fins, and with an increase in the size of the cooling fins themselves of the downstream heatsink, more material and, therefore, higher production costs are necessary.
Therefore, it could be helpful to propose a solution with which a sufficient cooling power can be achieved at both heat sinks, and the same time production costs can be reduced in comparison to known measures.